A Sign? For some days, Penny had been feeling that it might be important for us to go to a particular thrift store, a smaller one that we only occasionally visit. When we finally got around to it, we found, to our delight, a pair of small ukiyo-e prints, which we scooped up for more careful examination later. (They would prove to be reproductions.) I also picked up a small lacquerware plate that had a pleasing geometric pattern I thought I might use for some web page in the future. Meanwhile, Penny also found a lovely two-piece outfit that will do nicely for her in our work as visiting artists. Then, I saw it: A large book in a purple slip-case, cloth-covered, with the imperial chrysanthemum crest of Japan woven in. The Japanese title

皇居の四季、 (What's this?)

embossed in gold, means: "The Four Seasons of the Imperial Palace", and this proved to be the English title of the partly bilingual book. I flipped quickly through a few of the sumptuously illustrated pages, and knew this was a keeper. We paid for and brought our treasures home, only to put them aside as other life events intervened. Just tonight, I opened the book for a more thorough investigation.

Not just any copy of this weighty coffee table book, this particular copy has a presentation sheet glued in on the front flyleaf. Under Japanese text reading thus:

風雅にをけるもの造化にしたがひて四季を友とす
造化にしたがひ、造化にかへれとなり

俳聖松尾芭蕉 (一六四四 - 一六九四)

the inscription continues, in English (ellipsis as in original):

"People of refinement submit to nature and befriend
the four seasons . . .
Submit to nature, return to nature."

Haikai Saint Matsuo Bashô (1644-1694)

And so, tonight I make these words the gateway to Haikai Home. Click on the purple letters to enter.

What? If you see Japanese text on the line that sent you here, your system and browser are set to recognize Japanese text and you have an appropriate font already installed. If you don't deal with Japanese on your computer, chances are the material on the line that sent you here and a few lines below it appears to you as a row of question marks (like this: ??????????) or possibly some other gibberish, such as small squares, or simply leaves an inappropriate blank space. All the Japanese text given here is translated into English, either in the paragraph above (for example, the book title) or in type of the same color (the quotation), so there is no need to feel that you are missing something. (Return to the top.)

Copyright © 2003–2007 William J. Higginson. Copyright in all materials on this web site is retained by the authors. All rights reserved. No material from this web site may be copied on other web sites, produced in printed copies, or otherwise reproduced except as explicitly stated on a particular page, or by permission of the authors in writing. Please do not e-mail copies of this web page; rather, send the URL: http://haikai.home.att.net/continued.html. This page first posted 5 June 2007 and last updated 13 June 2007.